Starting a filipino virtual assistant company

[InstantNoodles]

I could hire workers from onlinejobs.ph or upwork.com.

I would vet them hard. Maybe hire only the top 25% or something. Then train them.

To differentiate, I would offer shared services. So you could get a quality VA part time for $200/mo or so.

What are your thoughts? Any tips/advice? Obviously this all comes down to execution (particularly marketing). To those who have hired VAs, what are your pain points?

BTW I am filipino and would have no problem visiting the Philippines if necessary.

 

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[DBXI]

Something like freeeup ? I think there is space in the market for sure. It's hard knowing what kind of VA you are hiring unless you give them a trial project. I would still probably go out and hire my own through upwork, fiverr, or onlinejobs but if my company was bigger and I needed a solid guy/gal asap a service like what your offering would be interesting.

 

[jon.a]

Show us some numbers

 

[lowtek]

One pain point... hiring freelancers involves hiring people with the freelancer mindset.

Mind blowing insight, I know.

When I'm hiring someone, what I REALLY want is someone with an employee (or maybe even ownership) mindset with all the perks of being a freelancer (i.e. no regulatory red tape). By which I mean someone who will be there at set hours and produce at a consistent pace on a timeline of my choosing. Many freelancers enjoy being "free" more than they enjoy being... lancers? Point is, they work odd hours and can be inconsistent.

I've heard this echoed by other business owners. Particularly with developers, as those folks tend to be cagey.

Solve this and I think you perhaps have something.

 

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[healthstatus]

The difference between the resume skills claimed and actual skills on the VA side is my biggest frustration. So a "validated" skill would be a huge help. For some tasks a VA version of designpickle.com for data entry, proofing, research, where the client says, this needs to be done, and some VA takes care of it, not always the same VA working on your project but based on availability and skills of the pool of workers you have.

 

[Utopia]

I could hire workers from onlinejobs.ph or upwork.com.

I would vet them hard. Maybe hire only the top 25% or something. Then train them.

To differentiate, I would offer shared services. So you could get a quality VA part time for $200/mo or so.

What are your thoughts? Any tips/advice? Obviously this all comes down to execution (particularly marketing). To those who have hired VAs, what are your pain points?

BTW I am filipino and would have no problem visiting the Philippines if necessary.

One pain point that you can address is having to pay freelancers a minimum amount of $5. Based on the market and demand for a lot of services, lower prices can still be of extreme value to freelancers. When I go to upwork and get 20 applicants for my $5/hour data entry job this is a sign that the supply for jobs is less than the demand for such jobs and thus I should be able to pay a lower price.

Freelancer.com allows you to go to $2/hour, yet this is still sometimes high for some tasks. I don't understand completely why they have the minimum fee (maybe upwork gains more profit this way), but it should be the case that I am able to pay the freelancers based on supply and demand.

 

[lowtek]

One pain point that you can address is having to pay freelancers a minimum amount of $5. Based on the market and demand for a lot of services, lower prices can still be of extreme value to freelancers. When I go to upwork and get 20 applicants for my $5/hour data entry job this is a sign that the supply for jobs is less than the demand for such jobs and thus I should be able to pay a lower price.

Freelancer.com allows you to go to $2/hour, yet this is still sometimes high for some tasks. I don't understand completely why they have the minimum fee (maybe upwork gains more profit this way), but it should be the case that I am able to pay the freelancers based on supply and demand.

I pay my Phillipino VA $3.75 an hour. Pretty sure you can go below $5 an hour on Upwork

 

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[rudyofer]

great. i hope you succeed